Azad lays foundation stone for new facilities in AIIMS

Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Ghulam Nabi Azad laying foundation stone of Mother & Child Block and Surgical Block, at AIIMS, in New Delhi on Monday.

NEW DELHI, Feb 3: Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad today laid the foundation stone of two blocks at the AIIMS that will add facilities of 600 beds and 24 operating theatres at a total cost of Rs 255 crores.
“Together these initiatives constitute a major breakthrough in the development of AIIMS infrastructure which has come under the severe strain due to increasing pressure of teaching, research and patient care activities,” Azad said, adding that the plan and non-plan budget for the current year was Rs 1340 crores.
The surgical block, will be spread over an area of 17000 sq meters and will have three basements and nine floors.
It will have 200 beds, 12 operation theatres, a national endoscopy centre, a high dependency unit and transplant facilities.
The facilities would be constructed at an estimated cost of Rs 55 Crores approximately and is expected to be ready by April 2015, Azad said.
Further, the state-of-the art Mother and Child block will be built over an area of about 45,000 sq meters and will also have three basements and nine floors.
“The block will have adequate facilities for department of paediatrics as well as obstetrics and gynaecology and will house inter-alia, 400 beds, 12 operation theatres, ICUs , day care facilities seminar halls. The project will cost around Rs 200 core and expected to be completed in about 2 years,” he said.
Also, the 6 new AIIMS and 19 institutions taken up in 1st and 2nd Phase of PMSSY would provide speciality and super-speciality care in all disciplines with a net addition of more than 11,000 beds covering 27 locations spread across the country, he added.
Azad said that the Cabinet has approved 71 new Cancer Institutes in December, 2013 at the national, state and tertiary levels.
The National Cancer Institute being set up at the second campus of AIIMS at Jhajjar, Haryana at a cost of nearly Rs. 2,000 crores, an amount of Rs. 3, 200 crores has already been approved by Government of India for setting up 70 more Institutes in different parts of the country, specifically for cancer, with facilities for chemotherapy, radiotherapy and onco-surgery.
The Chittaranjan National Cancer Institute at Kolkata is also being expanded with a second campus at a cost of Rs 400 crores. (PTI)